Herobrine and the Endermen
by Wandergirl108
Summary: Originally a one-chapter children's creepypasta, this story has evolved - or devolved - into an admittedly cliche message about the difference between fate and choice.  Enjoy!  And please read its counterpart by World3nder as well!
1. The Newcomers

Herobrine and the Endermen

In a single day and night, Herobrine's world had been transformed. Entire civilizations and buildings appeared from out of nowhere; ancient ruins and wondrous natural formations came into being; and even the light itself seemed to work differently. Minecraftia was suddenly an entirely new world.

More fascinating - and fearsome - than the structures and natural formations that appeared were the beings. At first, the residents of Minecraftia who had been around for many centuries were afraid of these new beings. Herobrine, of course, was the one responsible for welcoming any new being into Minecraftia, and, though it was difficult at first, the silverfish and cave spiders were eventually integrated into the Minecraftian community. The silverfish were an oddity in that they lived inside stone, but they were friendly and agreeable enough. The cave spiders, which inhabited special wood-lined caves, were also agreeable, though the old variety of spiders sometimes quarreled with them at first due to the venomous bite of the former and the superior size of the latter. It took a while for Herobrine to settle the disputes between the two races, but it worked out eventually.

In all, it was exhausting for Herobrine to welcome and native-ize the strange newcomers that suddenly appeared in Minecraftia, but it was well worth the effort, and the newcomers eventually became as much native residents of Minecraftia as the skeletons, spiders, zombies, Creepers, slimes, cows, sheep, pigs, chickens, wolves, and squid.

Getting the old residents of Minecraftia used to the new structures was, likewise, a challenge, as Herobrine himself had to adjust to them. Giant mushrooms, ravines, underground wooden structures, and giant underground strongholds were new and amazing spectacles, and all of the old residents of Minecraftia, Herobrine included, were awed by what Notch, the almighty Creator, had added to the world. Even the newcomers were impressed by their surroundings. The adjustment was gradual, but the negative effects were minimal, and most beings simply enjoyed their new world. There was a loss, however, that saddened Herobrine: for whatever reason, the Far Lands, Herobrine's long-cherished home, ceased to exist. Herobrine didn't know how or why his brother had done this, but accepted it as his almighty brother's will nonetheless.

Days after the amazing transformation had been worked on Minecraftia, however, Herobrine started receiving some distressing news. Beings of all races and species, with the exception of the squids and slimes were vanishing all over the world. There was no way to account for the disappearances; the sun would simply set, and when it rose, someone would be missing. Beings didn't go missing every night, and the number of disappearances per night was neither constant nor consistent, but something was definitely wrong.

As Minecraftia's supervisor and caretaker, Herobrine was deeply troubled by these disappearances. He asked everyone, of every race and species, if any of them had seen anything, but for a long time, his inquiries yielded no results. Then, one day, a spider came to him, badly wounded and babbling incoherently. Herobrine quickly worked a spell to heal the spider's wounds, but the spider was no easier to understand.

"My friend, what happened?" asked Herobrine.

"T-t-t-the b-b-black th-th-things!" the spider babbled. "T-th-they k-k-killed S-S-Skellita!"

"Skellita? What happened to Skellita?" Herobrine pressed.

"Th-th-th-they…k-k-k-killed…"

"What killed? Speak to me, friend! What happened?"

After a day and night spent in one of the underground community caves, Herobrine was able to calm the spider enough for it to answer his questions.

"What is your name?"

"S-S-Spinderon."

"Okay, Spinderon," Herobrine said calmly, "tell me what happened. It's okay. Just relax…breathe…"

The spider named Spinderon took a few steadying breaths, and finally told his story.

"Skellita and I were wandering around, enjoying the nighttime on the surface," he said, still shaky but finally coherent. "She was riding on my back." Herobrine nodded; spiders often gave skeletons rides on their backs. "We were wandering around," Spinderon continued, "when we saw some movement near the beach." Spinderon broke off and smiled nervously at Herobrine. "You always say to commune with our fellow Minecraftians," he said to Herobrine. It was true; Herobrine always preached, especially after the many new arrivals in the world, that all the native beings of Minecraftia, created by his almighty brother, Notch, should socialize and welcome each other. "Skellita wanted to greet whoever was on the beach, and I agreed, so I carried her over there…" Spinderon broke off again, and Herobrine could sense that terror was threatening to overwhelm him again.

"Relax, Spinderon, you are safe here," he said to Spinderon soothingly.

Spinderon shuddered, but managed to continue. "We went to speak with the beings on the beach, whoever they were," he went on, "but for some reason, we couldn't figure out what they were. They were just…black shapes…wandering around…" Spinderon shuddered again. "They were frightening," he told Herobrine. "They looked like shadows. They kept picking things up and putting them down elsewhere, it looked like at random."

"They picked things up?" Herobrine questioned sharply. This was a development; although he himself had the power to break things, he had never been able to carry blocks of material around or place them anywhere.

Spinderon nodded. "That's how we knew they were of no species we had ever heard of before," he said. "But we figured, they were the children of Notch, just like us, right?" He gave a humorless laugh. "When we got closer, we saw that the black things had your eyes…but as soon as we were close enough to make that out, the ones closest to us turned to us, and the ones that looked at us that were carrying materials dropped what they were holding." Spinderon shivered again. "They just stared at us," he told Herobrine, "and we just stared back. Skellita eventually managed to voice a greeting, but the things didn't say anything in response…they didn't even move." Another shudder. "Eventually, we got creeped out, and I turned away…and…and the next thing I knew…" He broke off, trembling with terror at the memory.

Herobrine took a few minutes to calm Spinderon before asking, "What happened?"

"The…the things…they attacked us!" Spinderon finally blurted out.

Herobrine blinked. "So? Humans attack your kind unprovoked all the time. This may be a crime among Minecraftians that will need to be sorted out, but…"

"They moved so fast!" Spinderon exclaimed. "They ran, and they teleported, and they were on top of us before we could react! Skellita started shooting arrows, and I tried to climb high into trees so that the things couldn't reach us, but those…things…those things!" He broke off, trembling again.

Again, Herobrine took some time to soothe Spinderon.

"Skellita and I killed the things that attacked us," Spinderon finally finished weakly, "but she was hurt too badly…she died, and there was nothing I could do…"

"You did well to come to me," Herobrine told Spinderon. "It may be that these creatures are behind the disappearances that have abounded throughout the world of Minecraftia since the Great Change." He paused. "What did these beings look like?" he asked after a minute. "I know you said that they are black and have my eyes, but what do they look like?"

"They looked…like people…but not people," Spinderon said hesitantly. "They were tall, and thin, and they had really long arms and legs…and they were black, and their eyes were all white, just like yours…but they were otherwise shaped like humans. Also, they gave off weird purple glitter."

Herobrine pondered this for a minute.

"Thank you, my friend," he said to Spinderon at last. "If it wouldn't be too much to ask, may I request that you inform as many of the Minecraftians as possible that they are not to venture above ground after dark - not even the night-walkers - until I have resolved this issue, and have the ones you tell help you spread the word?"

"You're not going to confront those things, are you?" exclaimed Spinderon.

"I must," answered Herobrine; "it is my duty. These beings have committed a crime, and even were this not the case, it is my job to help any new species or race in Minecraftia integrate into our world as seamlessly as possible. I must confront them, no matter the risk."

Despite Spinderon's many protests, Herobrine would not be swayed in the matter, and Spinderon reluctantly went to spread the word among the many residents, old and new, of Minecraftia.

Thus it came to be that Herobrine stood on the surface alone as the sun set, with no companion, day-walker or night-walker, anywhere in his sight. As darkness fell, Herobrine waited, knowing that the strange black creatures would appear somewhere, sometime.

The moon was rising to its peak in the sky when Herobrine detected movement in the distance. He headed toward the disturbance in the otherwise-still night, and sure enough, tall, thin, black figures came into view.

Herobrine stared at them from a distance for a minute. They looked so strange. Their appearances could not be adequately compared to that of any being in Minecraftia, and yet their forms were vaguely human.

But what _were_ they?

Herobrine approached the group. When he was close enough, some of the strange creatures froze, dropped what they were holding (in the cases of those that were holding something), and turned to stare at him. Herobrine saw that they did, indeed, have his eyes, though the direct contrast of the white of their eyes to the pitch-black of their skin made their eyes appear to glow.

There was silence, and apart from the more distant creatures, no one moved.

Herobrine cleared his throat. "Children of Notch, I greet you," he said.

The beings did not respond.

Herobrine took another step forward. "I said, I greet you," he repeated.

Still, the black figures said nothing.

Getting frustrated - no one had ever had the nerve not to answer him before - Herobrine declared, "In the name of my brother, almighty Notch, your creator, I command that you speak to me!"

The creatures still did not move or speak, but the night was no longer silent. A strange noise started to become audible to Herobrine's ears. At first, he thought it was some of the divine music that C418 had written that sometimes sounded throughout the land, but as he paid closer attention, it grew louder, and Herobrine realized that it was…whispers.

_Brother of Notch…_

_Our creator…_

_He is here…_

_He speaks to us…_

_He commands us…_

_He looks at us…_

_Why is he looking at us?…_

_He does not understand…_

_He does not know…_

"What do I not understand?" asked Herobrine. "What do I not know?"

_He hears us!…_

_Our voices…_

_How can that be?…_

_Brother of God…_

_So he claims…_

_Yet he must be…_

_Even if he does not know…_

_How else could he hear us?…_

_Yes, he must be…_

_How unfortunate that we have to kill him…_

_Do we have to kill him?…_

_We must…_

_He has seen us…_

_But does it matter?…_

_If he is God's brother…_

"Why does it matter that I have seen you?" asked Herobrine, frightened.

_He does not know…_

"No, I _don't_ know, so _tell_ me!" exclaimed Herobrine. "Who _are_ you?"

_We are the Endermen…_

_Spirits of shadow…_

_We cannot allow ourselves to be seen…_

_If you look at us directly…_

_You steal our soul…_

_We must kill to take it back…_

_Or you will take it from us…_

_We cannot move…_

_We are frozen by your gaze…_

_But when you look away…_

_We are free to move…_

_And we must move quickly…_

_Lest you take our souls away…_

"I am sorry to hear that that is your lot in life," Herobrine said honestly, "but Minecraftia is home to many other beings besides yourselves, and we all share this world; it is the Minecraftian way. While I realize that you are not visible during the day, for whatever reason, the people of Minecraftia, myself included, cannot simply give the nights to you. There are those who burn up in the light of the sun, and must walk the surface at night, if they are to walk it at all, and it would not be fair to deny them the trees and the sky for the sake of one people."

_They may have the trees…_

_And the sky…_

_So long as they do not look directly at us…_

_Or if they do…_

_And wish to live…_

_They must continue to look at us…_

_Until the sun rises…_

_For we are formless and powerless during the day…_

_And if caught in the gaze of another…_

_When the sun rises…_

_We will die…_

_But only if they look directly at us…_

"So you're saying that if someone sees you out of the corner of their eye, or in their peripheral vision, you will be unaffected?" asked Herobrine.

_Just so…_

_Brother of God…_

_Look…_

_The sun rises…_

_Those caught in your gaze will die…_

_Or you must die…_

_Do not look away…_

_Not if you wish to live…_

_Brother of God…_

"I cannot die a permanent death," Herobrine told them, "and, as caretaker of Minecraftia, and all of its people, I accept death so that you may live. Your lots in life are strange to me, but it is my hope that, someday, you and your kind can live peacefully among us, as our friends."

_As you wish…_

_Brother of God…_

_You are kind…_

_And we are sorry…_

_Sorry you looked at us…_

_For we must fight for our souls…_

"I understand," Herobrine told them; "it is natural for all living things to fight for the right to keep living."

He turned away.

He felt, rather than heard or saw, the Endermen leap at him, and the pain that shot through him was brief before he was swallowed by darkness.


	2. The Secret

Time went on, and Herobrine watched the Endermen closely, if from a distance. They were certainly unlike any other being that had ever been known to Minecraftia - even water hurt them. The many other inhabitants of Minecraftia knew to avoid looking directly at the Endermen, though there were occasionally accidents, and unfortunately, nothing could be done about such accidents when they happened. Eventually, Herobrine decided to supervise the above-ground ventures by night-walkers during the night, to make sure the Endermen were avoided, and thus, that there were no accidents. Of course, this wasn't a flawless system, and more than once Herobrine himself made the mistake of looking at an Enderman, but as he, like humans, was always revived elsewhere when he died, he always accepted death for the sake of the Endermen he looked at.

It truly pained Herobrine that he couldn't interact with the Endermen safely, as they were, like all of Notch's children, his responsibility, and ideally his friends. One night, however, Herobrine saw a human walking around with a pumpkin on its head wander right into a group of roaming Endermen…and nothing happened.

Herobrine watched, amazed. The Endermen completely ignored this silly human with a pumpkin on its head. The human in question didn't seem to be particularly avoiding the Endermen; on the contrary, it occasionally turned its head to look at one of the group…and still, nothing happened.

_Do pumpkins somehow shield the effect of looking at an Enderman?_ Herobrine wondered. As there was no real harm in trying it, he decided to do so.

Of course, with a pumpkin on his head, Herobrine was indistinguishable from humans, as his eyes were his only distinguishing characteristic, but as he, unlike humans, could converse with the other inhabitants of Minecraftia, the confusion caused by the ruse was quickly settled whenever Herobrine ran into a fellow Minecraftian on the night he decided to try it out. Wearing a pumpkin also made Herobrine feel very silly, but he decided that if there was even a chance that he could interact safely with the Endermen, his pride was a small sacrifice. Thus came the night when Herobrine, wearing a pumpkin on his head, met a group of Endermen, and was able to safely converse with them for the first time.

"O children of Notch, it heartens me that we may speak in safety at last!" Herobrine exclaimed when the pumpkin worked.

_Is that him?…_

_Brother of God…_

_It must be…_

_He speaks…_

"Please, friends, my name is Herobrine," said Herobrine.

_Herobrine…_

_"Hero"…"brine"…_

_An interesting name…_

_For the brother of God…_

Herobrine smiled; his name _was_ pretty strange.

Being at last able to talk with the Endermen at length, Herobrine gave them his long-overdue welcome speech, and started telling them about the world they were now part of. Night passed quickly, and Herobrine and the Endermen soon had to go underground. They were good listeners, and Herobrine was able to share all the secrets of Minecraftia with them in a matter of days.

"I hope you can share what I have told you with your fellows in my stead," Herobrine said when he was done, "as I-"

_We already have…_

"What?" Herobrine was surprised.

_We told you…_

_We are spirits of shadow…_

_Where there are shadows…_

_And some of us in person…_

_There our ears are as well…_

_All of our kind have been listening…_

"Oh." Herobrine took a moment to process this.

_This world is strange…_

_Thank you for explaining it to us…_

_We are lost here…_

_We do not belong here…_

_Yet you welcome us…_

_Thank you, Herobrine…_

"You're quite welcome," Herobrine said automatically, still trying to process what they were saying.

There was a pause. Herobrine could still barely make out some whispers, but he had a feeling they weren't directed at him.

Finally, he said, "Your kind are strange to me…I've never before known of beings that are harmed by water."

_Water is strange to us…_

_Foreign to us…_

_You think we are strange…_

_Yet to us…_

You_ are strange…_

_Perhaps that is understandable…_

_In that what is different…_

_Is hard to understand…_

"You say water is foreign to you…" Herobrine half-asked.

_Yes…_

"Are you…not from here?" asked Herobrine. "You say you do not belong here, but…"

_This is not our home…_

_We do come from elsewhere…_

_Though we are your brother's children…_

_This dimension is not ours…_

_Yet we are trapped…_

_We cannot go home…_

"Where are you from?" asked Herobrine. "The Nether?"

_What is this…?_

_"The Nether"…?_

_We do not know this word…_

"The Nether is a dimension connected to this one," Herobrine explained, realizing he had forgotten to mention the Nether when he was sharing the secrets of Minecraftia with them. "I've never been there myself, but I hear it's a very dangerous and frightening place, full of fire and lava."

_No…_

_That is not our home…_

_Where we come from…_

_There is no fire…_

_No lava…_

_No water…_

_No trees…_

_No grass…_

_No snow…_

_No plants…_

_No sun…_

_No moon…_

_No stars…_

"What _is_ there?" Herobrine asked, confused.

_Empty space…_

_A safe place…_

_White stone…_

_Black towers…_

_And a sky…_

_An empty sky…_

_Full of nothingness…_

_Nothing more…_

Though the voices of the Endermen were nothing more than whispers, Herobrine thought he could hear wistfulness in their words, and a longing for something long-gone.

"How did you get here?" he asked.

The whispers stopped, and all the Endermen stared intensely at Herobrine. For a minute, Herobrine was afraid that the pumpkin on his head had stopped working or come off, but then a single whispered word drifted through the air:

_Come…_

The Endermen all turned suddenly and started heading down a branch of the cave. Realizing that he was supposed to follow them, Herobrine did so.

Occasionally, the way was blocked by underground waterfalls or lavafalls, both of which Herobrine had to clear himself, as the Endermen couldn't get near either of these obstacles. It was difficult going in places, but they finally managed to reach a stronghold.

Strongholds were one of several new features of the world of Minecraftia that had recently come to be. Herobrine had no idea who was even _supposed_ to have made them - as they were clearly supposed to have been built by _someone_ - but had accepted them with passive intrigue.

The group of Endermen, with Herobrine in their wake, made their way through the stronghold, and they were quickly passing through rooms Herobrine hadn't explored. Eventually, they were met by a swarm of silverfish.

_Silverfish…_

_Our little guardians…_

_Born when we broke through…_

_How are you, little ones?…_

"Endermen!" they squeaked. "Endermen! Welcome home! We work hard! We protect you!" Suddenly, they spotted Herobrine. "Human!" they exclaimed. "Human! Human! Human! Go away!"

"I am not human, friends!" Herobrine exclaimed as the group swarmed towards him. "It is I, Herobrine!"

The angry swarm calmed down. "Herobrine!" they squeaked. "Herobrine! With a pumpkin! You look silly! You look human!"

"I apologize, friends," said Herobrine; "this is the only way I can be close to the Endermen without stealing their souls with my gaze."

"Herobrine! You protect them! Notch's brother! You are good!"

Herobrine couldn't help but smile at the squeaking creatures. They could be pesky for humans, but they were good Minecraftians.

The Endermen spoke again.

_Is it safe?…_

"It is safe!" squeaked the silverfish. "Always safe! That's our job! We protect it!"

"'It'?" questioned Herobrine.

_Come…_

_Little friends…_

_Escort us to it…_

_Herobrine…_

_He must see…_

_We would share it with him…_

"Right this way!" squeaked the silverfish. "Come with us! We show you! Herobrine!"

Curious, Herobrine followed the Endermen and the silverfish that flowed together through the stronghold like a wave, like a swarm of ants. They came to a room in which Herobrine was surprised to find a silverfish birthing cage.

"I didn't know there were silverfish birthing areas," Herobrine commented out loud.

_Of course there are…_

_Where did you think they came from?…_

_They are not day-walkers…_

_They do not breed…_

"I guess I never thought about it," Herobrine admitted. "I didn't know they didn't breed."

_They do not…_

_They came with us…_

_Though there are none in our home…_

"Do you not breed?" asked Herobrine.

_Not here…_

"Herobrine!" squeaked the silverfish. "Come and see! Look in there! There it is!" They parted, forming an open path between Herobrine and the entrance to a room from which light was emanating. Herobrine stepped forward and looked inside.

There, on the floor, was a square frame of strange blue blocks, some cracked, some not, with a lava pool at the bottom of the pit they surrounded.

Herobrine turned back to the Endermen. "What is this?" he asked them.

_That is our way home…_

_Or it was…_

_We didn't make it…_

_Nor did we break it…_

_But now it is broken…_

_And we are stuck here…_

_Trapped in this world…_

_Unable to go home…_

_To where we belong…_

_To where there is only shadow…_

"Portal!" squeaked the silverfish. "Portal! Portal! Ender portal! Broken portal! Portal to The End!"

"'The End'?" questioned Herobrine.

_Our home…_

_Our long-lost home…_

_Through the portal…_

_To our world…_

_We are the Endermen…_

_We are from The End…_

_Hence our name…_

"Oh." Herobrine turned back to the broken portal. "Can it be fixed?" he asked them.

_If only…_

_Perhaps it can…_

_But we cannot…_

_We cannot fix it…_

_We hold the power…_

_But cannot use it…_

_Trapped within us…_

_Mocking us…_

_The power to go home…_

"Is there any way I can help?" asked Herobrine.

_No…_

_We do not know…_

_What is required…_

_To fix the portal…_

"Eyes of Ender!" squeaked the silverfish. "Ender pearls! And blaze rods! Craft! Mix! Fix!"

_Craft?…_

_Mix?…_

_Fix?…_

_Little guardians…_

_What are you talking about?…_

_You never told us…_

_Eyes of Ender?…_

_What are those?…_

"To The Nether!" squeaked the silverfish. "Kill the blaze! Endermen! Pearls from death! Craft! Mix! Fix!"

The Endermen turned to one another, and the whispers of their voices became incoherent as they all spoke questioningly to one other at once. The silverfish, meanwhile, had grown very agitated, and were scuttling to and fro all over the place. The resulting chaos was utterly bewildering to Herobrine.

"Craft! Mix! Fix!" squeaked the silverfish, over and over again. "Craft! Mix! Fix!"

"_Enough_!" Herobrine finally shouted.

Almost instantly, the silverfish regrouped on either side of the room that held the birthing cage, the Endermen all turned to Herobrine, and everything was silent and still.

Herobrine slowly turned his covered head to acknowledge each and every being before him before finally speaking. "I will try to find answers," he told them. "In the meantime…" He looked up at the Endermen in the room. "I thank you for sharing your secret with me, friends," he said. "I will do my best to find a way to send you home."

_Thank you…_

_You are kind…_

_Long have we suffered…_

_We want to go home…_

"It is my duty to assist my fellow Minecraftians however I can," he assured them, "and though you may be from another dimension, you are Minecraftians nonetheless, as you are the children of my brother, Notch. I bid you all farewell."

_And we you…_

_Brother of God…_

_Herobrine..._

Herobrine nodded. Then, he left the stronghold and went outside, and finally, he was able to take the pumpkin off of his head. He set it down, then turned to the sky pensively.

_"Kill the blaze!"…"To The Nether!"…"Craft! Mix! Fix!"…_ The words of the silverfish echoed in Herobrine's head.

_"Craft! Mix! Fix!",_ he thought. _Crafting is something humans do, and if The Nether is somehow involved, there may be little that I can do to help the Endermen get home. Of course, _humans_ have an insatiable curiosity…if they find out about this place the Endermen are from, surely they will want to journey there to see it for themselves. Humans may be the Endermen's only hope…_

_Talk about irony…_


	3. To The Nether!

Herobrine stared at the portal, feeling something he had never truly felt before: fear.

He had heard of The Nether; sometimes, little bits and pieces of information came to him, and he didn't know the source, though he suspected he was sharing a piece of consciousness with his almighty brother and creator, Notch (though it was odd that this had not happened in the case of the Endermen or Ender Portal). All he knew was that it was full of fire and lava and strange, dangerous creatures whose noises could be heard from hundreds of meters away. Sometimes, humans went to The Nether, and brought back substances unlike any that could be found in his dimension, The Overworld: brown sand made of Creepers' faces - Soul Sand - that slowed the movements of any who walked on it, and had several other strange features; bright red rock - Netherrack - that, when set alight, burned forever, and was somehow oddly more brittle than any other solid substance in existence; and, most amazing of all, Glowstone - the rock that burned with a light as bright as lava, but was utterly harmless, if extremely difficult to gather. It was Glowstone that drew humans to The Nether, Herobrine knew; its value lay in its harmless but bright light - valuable, because humans needed light more than any native of Minecraftia: it protected them from the appearance of night-walkers (all of whom had sworn to kill any human they came across), it aided their severely impaired eyes, and - a novelty - they even liked to use light to decorate things.

In other words, it held no value for Herobrine.

But now, there was something in The Nether that did: blaze rods. According to the silverfish, blaze rods were needed to fix the Ender Portal in the underground stronghold, which, in turn, was the only way to help the Endermen get home…and Herobrine had sworn he would do everything in his power to help the Endermen get home. Also according to the silverfish, blaze rods could only be found in The Nether. Herobrine had taken a while to decipher their oddly cryptic statements - odd, because they were normally such simple creatures - but he had figured out what their words meant: _"To The Nether! Kill the blaze!"_

They meant that, if Herobrine was to help the Endermen, then for the first time since it had come into being, Herobrine was going to have to travel to The Nether.

_How convenient of that human to leave this portal wide open for me,_ Herobrine thought with a hint of sarcasm. He steadied himself, and before he could lose his nerve, Herobrine jumped into the portal.

Immediately, a purple aura swirled around him, growing thicker and thicker as the world around him swam and blurred together, until all of Minecraftia was obscured from his vision. He heard a strange sound, a sound he knew meant he was being transported to a different dimension, but oddly enough, he felt nothing unusual.

The swirling purple aura cleared slowly, the world around him settled, and-

A wave of heat crashed over him.

It was hot in The Nether!

Herobrine quickly stepped out of the portal, but the heat only got worse when he did so. _No matter,_ he told himself, _I can tolerate it._ And he certainly could; he'd been near lava enough that intense heat wasn't a completely unfamiliar sensation to him, though it was so hot in The Nether that he wondered how humans could stand it. Really, he felt like he was about to catch on fire!

_They do not feel it…_ The words drifted through Herobrine's mind - the same as it did whenever he picked up a bit of information from whatever source that told him about the world he lived in and the people in it.

_That's right,_ he remembered, _humans inhabit avatars when they enter Minecraftia; they do not feel pain, heat, or cold in this world…_

Setting thoughts of humans and their pseudo-status as living things, Herobrine looked around him. Signs of the human who had made the portal he had used were everywhere-

"Oh, you again," came a voice that was somewhere between a groan and a grunt.

Herobrine turned, and came face to face with one of the strangest things he had ever seen. There was something vaguely familiar about the being, but in the strange light cast by the random fires - light that seemed to work differently than it did in Herobrine's native dimension - he couldn't be sure why the creature looked familiar. It looked like a cross between a pig and a skeleton, but the strangest thing about it was that it carried a sword - no creatures other than humans carried tools…

Still, this creature was a creation of Notch, and thus, it was Herobrine's responsibility and, ideally, his friend.

"Greetings, o child of my brother," Herobrine said formally.

"You speak!" squealed the creature. 'Squealed' was definitely the right word; it's groaning, grunt-like voice had gone high pitched and agitated.

"My friend, I am not a human," Herobrine said good-naturedly. "I am Herobrine."

"Herobrine…" the creature grunted, its voice back to its previous low, grunt-like state.

There was a pause, and Herobrine and the creature stared at each other.

"Is that supposed to mean something to me?" the creature finally asked.

Herobrine was stunned. "Does the name of the brother of your creator truly mean nothing to you?" Herobrine asked indignantly; the Endermen hadn't known his name before he had introduced himself, but this was different.

"The brother of my creator…" the creature repeated.

Suddenly, that strange intuition Herobrine had spoke to him again.

_Not 'creature'…Zombie Pigman…_

Suddenly, Herobrine understood why this creature looked familiar: such creatures were created in his native dimension when a bolt of lightning struck a pig.

Then, the Zombie Pigman said something that shocked Herobrine right to his very soul.

"Who is my creator?" it asked.

"You don't know?" Herobrine exclaimed. "Notch, of course! Almighty Notch, my brother, creator of Minecraftia!"

"'Minecraftia'?" the Zombie Pigman repeated, sounding confused.

This was a situation Herobrine had never encountered before. Since when did one of his brother's children not know of his brother, or of the name of the world into which they had been born?

_The name of the world into which they had been born…_

"Minecraftia is the world we all live in," Herobrine said. "The name includes this dimension, The Nether, as well as the one from whence I have come, The Overworld." He paused, then added, "I believe it also encompasses the world from which the Endermen come, The End, but that doesn't concern you, and probably means nothing to you."

"Not a thing," the Zombie Pigman said affirmatively, "nor does 'The Overworld', but The Nether is a name I know well. It is my home, and always has been."

Herobrine nodded.

"So, you are the brother of my creator, whom you call Notch," the Zombie Pigman said, as though reviewing what Herobrine had told him.

"That is correct," Herobrine replied.

"Why have you come to this place?" asked the Zombie Pigman. "Humans occasionally come to raid our world of Glowstone and mushrooms, as well as Netherrack and Soul Sand occasionally; what business could you have here?"

"I have come on account of a problem that has come up back in my home dimension," Herobrine answered.

"You are not here for my people?" asked the Zombie Pigman.

Herobrine blinked. "What?"

"My people have been trapped in this dimension, as have the Ghasts," the Zombie Pigman said. "We have only glimpsed, through the Ghasts, visions of the world you come from: a world where fire and lava are rare, where heat doesn't roast our flesh no matter where we stand, where there is a sky and water and a color called blue. We long for these wonders, yet we are trapped; those portals hold no power for us."

"Oh," Herobrine said, surprised. "Forgive me, I was unaware of your plight. I wish I could help you, but I am afraid that I cannot…though I can assure you that I would if I could."

The Zombie Pigman was silent for a moment. When it - he - spoke, he did so slowly, as though choosing his words carefully. "The Ghasts may know of you. They may even see your coming as a sign of the salvation they long for. Please be gentle with them; they have spent all of eternity in anguish."

"I will keep that in mind," Herobrine assured the Zombie Pigman.

The Zombie Pigman gave Herobrine a long look. "Welcome to Hell," he finally said, and he walked away.

Herobrine stared after him. The Endermen were unhappy because they were locked _out_ of their native dimension; Herobrine had never contemplated the idea that a being could be unhappy because it was locked _inside_ its native dimension.

And then there was the name of the creatures the Zombie Pigman referenced: Ghasts. What were Ghasts?

_Tortured souls…_ whispered Herobrine's intuition, though the words meant little to him. Why would his brother create beings whose lives were nothing but pain? That didn't make sense. Even the zombies and skeletons back home were happy…even _Creepers_ were happy, though their faces were frozen in eternal frowns and it was their lot in life to die in devastating explosions.

Suddenly, Herobrine heard a strange, chirping sob that sounded like a cry of the damned. What in Minecraftia…?

_Ghasts…_ whispered the voice in Herobrine's head.

More of the strange noises started joining the first, until Herobrine felt like he was literally listening to a chorus of the damned. It was a terrible, haunting pseudo-melody that made Herobrine very, very sad…not least because he knew he was going to have to face whatever was making those noises, and because they might be filled with hope upon seeing him, only to have their hopes shattered. It pained Herobrine very much that he could do nothing to help ease the obvious suffering in the cries of these creatures.

Nonetheless, Herobrine went and sought them out. The cries seemed to come from everywhere, so it wasn't easy, and along the way, Herobrine took in his surroundings. Everything was mostly made of Netherrack, some of which was on fire. There were lavafalls everywhere, even lava pits. He came across patches of Soul Sand, and was surprised to come across enormous patches of mushrooms - he had never seen so many in one place. Glowstone was present in abundance, too, hanging off the Netherrack ceilings in structures that made Herobrine think of frozen lightning. Occasionally, Herobrine came across gravel, which came as a huge surprise to him. At first, he thought that perhaps the human who had created the portal that had brought Herobrine to The Nether had put it there - true, Herobrine couldn't imagine why a human would do that, but was there really any understanding the actions of humans? - but Herobrine quickly found himself outside the range of the human's explorations, and the gravel did not cease. Odd.

There was no sky. Herobrine found that a bit disconcerting. The Nether itself seemed to be a cave. Herobrine was so busy staring at the rock ceiling that he almost didn't catch himself before he fell into the ocean of lava.

He stopped short. A huge expanse of The Nether had opened up before him, with little Netherrack islands floating around over a vast ocean of lava. Lavafalls poured into the lava ocean from the ceiling and the islands - Herobrine couldn't even see where most of them originated. In an otherworldly, somewhat scary sense, it was a breathtaking sight…so Herobrine didn't notice the enormous white creatures that floated around in the vast space until one of them saw him and, with a cry that could come from no sane being, spat a ball of fire in Herobrine's direction.

Herobrine quickly jumped out of the path of the fireball, and was surprised when it created a crater in the Netherrack where he had been standing. Frightened, he called out, "Do not attack me, friend; I mean you no harm! I am Herobrine, brother of your creator, and I wish only well-being to all living things!"

"H…Herobrine?" the creature sobbed. "You've come?"

It truly pained Herobrine to hear the desperate hope in the creature's - _Ghast's_ - voice. "Yes, it is I," Herobrine said. "A Zombie Pigman told me of your plight when I got here, and I am sorry to tell you that I cannot help you. I truly do wish I could, but I have no control over the power to enter and leave different dimensions."

"But…you're his brother!" wailed another Ghast, joining the conversation. "Our creator's brother!"

"I have no control over such things," Herobrine repeated. "I give you my word, it truly pains me to admit it, but only my brother has the power to set you free. Were I still in the Great Beyond with him, I might have some say, but if that were the case, I would not be able to speak with you."

"But…you came!" exclaimed another.

Herobrine sighed. "There is a race of beings from a dimension, neither this one nor the one from whence I have come, that is currently trapped in my native dimension. Yet another race that came with them said that the key to getting them home resided here."

"Who wouldn't want to be in your dimension?" sobbed yet another Ghast. "Water and sky…"

"Water is harmful to them, as is the light of the sun," replied Herobrine.

"Why do they get to get out?" wailed one of the Ghasts who had spoken previously (Herobrine had already lost track of them all).

"I know not, but I know that they suffer, and that it is my duty to relieve their suffering," Herobrine replied. He thought about what he'd said for a moment, then quickly added, "as I would yours, if I had the power."

"We were supposed to be able to use the portals," wept a newcomer to the crowd of enormous white creatures that drifted through the air, seemingly without their willing or controlling their movements.

_They may yet…_ whispered Herobrine's intuition.

"You yet may," Herobrine said out loud. "That gift is not outside my brother's power to grant. But…" He hesitated; clearly, these creatures were suffering, but he knew only too well the pain that came with losing one's home, as he had lost his own long-cherished home, the Far Lands, when the Great Change was worked on Minecraftia. "Why do you so wish to leave this place?" he finally asked. "It is, after all, your home…" He paused briefly as his intuition whispered something to him, then added, "and I know, somehow, that the lava here does not harm you; you are completely fireproof, and are not harmed even when you burn. It seems as though you were made to live in this place. What is more, you fly; the terrible drops here hold no hazard for you."

"Your world has hazards like that, too!" cried one of them.

"Yeah, we know, and your world has so much more space to fly in!" added another mournfully.

"We could drift contentedly, if only we had a sky to drift in," sobbed a third.

"And your world is so beautiful!" wailed a fourth. "We've seen glimpses of it! So beautiful!"

"Glimpses of it?" questioned Herobrine. "What do you mean?"

"We are tormented, taunted by images of your beautiful home!" wept yet another Ghast. "When we close our eyes, we see its beauty, out of reach, taunting us! It is what makes us weep!"

The Ghast's words were like daggers in Herobrine's heart. Why would his brother condemn any creature to such a horrible fate?

"And we can only open our eyes when we attack!" added another, its voice filled with anguish. "We attack humans, for we envy their world!"

"Minecraftia is not the humans' world!" Herobrine cried out sharply as the Ghast's words hit a nerve. "They are _invaders_! _Aliens_! They do not belong in Minecraftia!"

"Just as we would be, were we allowed to enter it!" exclaimed a Ghast in response. "Humans take advantage of the beautiful gift they have: the ability to leave their world and enter your beautiful, wondrous land! They do not appreciate its beauty! They kill and destroy and build without thought, marring the beautiful landscapes of your home!"

"We would not do that, if we could leave!" cried another. "We would respect the world, and appreciate it, if we only had the power to leave this place!"

Their words broke Herobrine's heart beyond anything he had ever known before. With another stab that pierced his heart, Herobrine realized what the Ghast that had attacked him had said as it had done so; he hadn't recognized the fact that the Ghast had even been speaking at all, the madness had been so evident in its voice, but he understood now: _"Die, demon!"_

"My friends, I am truly sorry that that is your lot in life," Herobrine said, and he had never been more sincere about anything in his life. "I wish - I truly wish, with all my heart - that I could help you, and I cannot express in words how much it pains me that I cannot." He took a breath to fortify himself, then went on, "But there are those I can help; the Endermen are trapped, suffering, in my home dimension, just as you all are trapped here. I was told that the key to getting them back to where they belong - to where they would be happiest - resides somewhere in this dimension, and though I wish I could help you as well, I am here to help them get home. Does the term 'blaze rods' mean anything to you?"

For a minute, the Ghasts were all silent, save for their continuous weeping that broke Herobrine's heart even further with every sob.

"The Blaze," one of them finally choked. "He's talking about the newcomers."

"If he needs blaze rods, he won't get them," murmured another, solemn, but oddly tearless one. "Notch traps people where they don't want to be, and nothing can be done."

"Newcomers?" asked Herobrine.

"Some new beings came here recently, plus some buildings that almost look like humans made them," the somber one said. "Completely new materials and structures came to be, and even a new plant exclusive to this dimension has grown around them. Also, the Far Lands-"

"Are gone," Herobrine finished. "Yes, they are gone in my dimension as well." He sighed sadly, then added, "The Far Lands were once my home. That is why I did not understand, right away, why you wished to leave this place in which you were born; I know the pain of losing one's home."

The Ghasts did not respond to this. Instead, they sobbed brokenly for a minute, saying nothing at all. Finally, the calm one spoke again.

"Magma Cubes and Blaze now share this dimension," it told Herobrine. "If you wish to see them, follow this ledge until you come to a bridge, then cross it. It will take you where you wish to go."

"Thank you, friend," Herobrine said.

As though his words had broken a spell, all the Ghasts that had crowded around him suddenly began to drift in various, seemingly random directions.

"Be well on your way, Herobrine," the calm one said, and then it drifted far away.

"Thank you, friend," Herobrine repeated softly to the air, "and I wish you and your kin may somehow find happiness."

Then, he turned left and began following the ledge over the ocean of lava.


	4. The Impossible Choice

_It's magnificent,_ was all Herobrine could think.

He had followed the Ghast's directions and come to a bridge made of a dark material which, though it was definitely Netherian, reminded Herobrine vaguely of bricks, a strange creation of humans that they made from clay. He'd crossed it, as instructed, and now stood before a magnificent citadel. As Herobrine approached it, it amazed him all the more that the dimension that had such a horrible reputation could also be so beautiful.

The bridge he'd been walking on became the structure's rooftop…and it was quite a structure. It sliced right through the Netherrack, as though the Netherrack had been cleared just enough to make room for it and not a bit more. It looked like there were multiple rooms inside, and Herobrine knew what he was looking for had to be in one of them.

Suddenly, a voice behind him shouted, "You!"

Herobrine turned and saw the strangest thing he had seen in minutes, which was still a lot more strange than anything he had seen before the Endermen had come. In fact, the creature he saw looked like a Slime, and for a moment, Herobrine felt a bit of nostalgia for the days when Slimes were Minecraftia's greatest oddities (along with the Creepers). The resemblance the thing had to Slimes vanished, however, when it jumped towards him and came apart in layers, revealing a glowing core.

Then Herobrine realized what the thing had said, and, understanding what it must have been thinking, immediately said to it, "Peace, friend, I am Herobrine; we have not met, but I mean you no harm."

"Herobrine?" asked the thing, stopping short. "I've heard that name…I think the Ghasts talk about you sometimes."

_What are you?_ Herobrine almost asked, but before he could speak the words, his intuition said, _Magma Cube…_

His question answered, Herobrine instead replied, "I am the brother of your creator, Notch; long dead in his realm, I was resurrected here to oversee the world he created." He paused, then added, "You are a Magma Cube. The Ghasts spoke of you and your kind, as well."

"You've talked to the Ghasts?" the Magma Cube asked. Before Herobrine could reply that yes, he had, the Magma Cube said, "Have you told them to stop crying? It's really annoying."

"I…" Herobrine didn't know what to say.

"You didn't tell them to stop crying, did you?" the Magma Cube said, making it more of a statement than a question. It sighed. "Well, I know they're still crying, but I'd hoped you'd at least tried to talk some sense into them. They were made for this place, just as my kind were."

"So…you are happy here?" Herobrine asked.

"Of course!" replied the Magma Cube. "I was created to live here! The Nether is my home! Same goes for the rest of my kind."

Herobrine smiled. "I am glad to hear it," he said sincerely.

"If you didn't get them to stop crying, you're not here to get them out," the Magma Cube said. "So…why are you here?" Its words would have been blunt if not for its friendly tone of voice.

"Does the term 'blaze rods' mean anything to you?" Herobrine asked in reply. "I'm here for some, as I was told they could be used to fix a…problem, back in my native dimension."

To his alarm, the Magma Cube laughed. "Good luck with that! The Blaze are in the citadel, but they won't be giving you any without a fight!" And it hopped away, coming apart in the air and back together in a little burst of embers each time it hit the ground. Its movements were so intricate, Herobrine was too absorbed in watching to understand its words until it was gone.

Then they hit him like a diamond sword.

_They won't give me any without a fight?_ That didn't sound good to Herobrine at all; he hated the thought of having to battle a fellow Minecraftian, for any reason. _Reason…I will reason with them,_ he told himself firmly. _I will_ not _fight them._

Herobrine entered the citadel.

As he'd expected, there were many separate rooms inside. Some of them held nothing more than tiny holes full of lava, some held nothing at all. Eventually, however, Herobrine found a room with stairs, beside which a strange plant that reminded Herobrine vaguely of mushrooms grew. He went up the stairs, and found himself in a small room with a birthing cage.

_A birthing cage? In The Nether? How strange…_

Then, it gave birth.

Herobrine had seen many, very strange things, especially in recent times, but what came out of the Netherian birthing cage surpassed all the strangeness he had ever seen; it was even stranger than a Magma Cube coming apart as it jumped around.

The creature appeared to be a simple, floating head, supported by rotating rings of vertical rods. _Blaze rods, perhaps?_ When it saw Herobrine, smoke filled the center of its body, and it floated into the air. Caught completely by surprise, Herobrine watched as, without a word, it caught fire, then spat three fireballs at him.

Just in time, Herobrine jumped out of the way. He looked back where he had been standing, expecting to see a crater like the Ghast's fireball had left, and was alarmed to instead find that the creature's fireballs had ignited the strange, dark, brick-like material that formed the citadel.

The creature - Blaze, it had to be a Blaze, Herobrine didn't need a prod from his intuition to figure it out - caught fire again. Before it could shoot again, however, Herobrine cried out, "Stop! Please! I mean you no harm! I am Herobrine!"

At the last minute, the Blaze turned and spat its fireballs in a different direction, away from Herobrine. At the same time, the cage gave birth again.

"You speak?" said the newborn Blaze with surprise.

"Yes, I speak," said Herobrine; "I am not human. My brother, Notch, is your creator, and I am the caretaker of all of Minecraftia - which includes this dimension, The Nether."

"Then leave," said the older Blaze. "There is no caretaking that needs to be done here."

"I am sure of that, but I have come to ask a favor of you," Herobrine said as the cage gave birth again.

"And why should we do you a favor?" asked the newly born Blaze.

"Because it is the Minecraftian way to help a fellow Minecraftian when asked," Herobrine replied, somewhat surprised at the question.

"That's news to me," said one of the Blaze. "What say you, brother?"

"I've heard no such thing," said the Blaze the first one addressed. "I see no reason to help someone I've never met."

The fact that they didn't know it was strange, even though they had just been born; newborn creatures in Minecraftia inherited the collective knowledge of their ancestors. Then again, Herobrine supposed there was no way they could have known except from the Ghasts, and the Ghasts hadn't seemed like the type of beings to preach.

"It is the Minecraftian way, and as you are the children of my brother, Notch, you are expected to hold to it," Herobrine told the Blaze firmly. "I've come seeking blaze rods; there is a race of beings trapped in my native dimension who wish to return home, and I have been told that blaze rods are the key to fixing the gateway. May I have some?"

The three Blaze looked at Herobrine silently for a minute. Then, as one, they all suddenly caught fire and shot at him.

Herobrine barely managed to escape the onslaught of fire.

"Blaze rods are part of our bodies!" exclaimed one of the Blaze. "We cannot give them to you; you must kill us to take them!"

"Please, friends, I would not like to have to kill anyone!" Herobrine cried in response.

"Then leave!" the three Blaze cried as one, and they shot at him again.

Herobrine did something he'd never done before in his entire life: he fled. He fled down the stairs, through the citadel, across the bridge, along the Netherrack ledge over the ocean of lava, through the caves, all the way back to the portal to his home dimension. He wanted to go home. He wanted to get away from the Blaze, and the impossible choice he had been given. He wanted to go back to a time when everything was clear and simple and the Far Lands were his treasured, untouchable refuge, and the strangest sight to be seen in all of Minecraftia. He didn't just flee the Blaze, or even The Nether; he tried, with all his might, to flee his new reality.

Even though that was something he couldn't escape.


	5. The Paradox

Herobrine was lost.

Not in his world; he could find his way around just fine. Unfortunately, that was the only way in which he _wasn't_ lost. He started withdrawing from his friends, avoiding everyone in Minecraftia, preferring to be alone with the thoughts that were driving him to madness.

He had always believed that he had been born…reincarnated…created in Minecraftia by his brother to oversee his brother's world and its workings. He had believed it was his duty, his purpose, to help any and all of his brother's creations in every way.

But now, an impossible possibility had presented himself to him: maybe that wasn't his purpose at all. After all, if that was truly his purpose, why would his brother have given him such an impossible situation as needing to kill one race to save another? Then again, if that wasn't his purpose, what, then, _was_ his purpose?

For the first time since shortly after he had been born with the knowledge of who he was, Herobrine tried to see if he could actually remember his brother; if any of his memories as Notch's brother, from his past life, remained. He remembered nothing. Not a bit. He couldn't even remember how he had died. He knew he had died, but he didn't even know how he knew that.

He didn't know how he knew anything.

He didn't even know that he _did_ know anything.

Herobrine felt like his whole world was coming crashing down around him. Everything felt wrong. Everything _was_ wrong. As he fell more and more into his terrifying thoughts, a truly horrid idea came to him: what if his brother didn't care about the people of Minecraftia at all? What if his brother wanted humans there, to destroy and build and slaughter?

Was Minecraftia a joke to his brother? Was it even real to him at all?

Herobrine realized that he had no idea.

_But Minecraftia_ is _real,_ Herobrine told himself. I'm _real. I think. I feel. I live. I must be real…and so must my world._

_…But does he know that?_

Surely he must. He created it.

_But does a god truly view his creations as real? He's just a man in the Great Beyond, no less mortal than any of my friends…even more mortal than I am, now._

How could he not view his creations as real? Surely, they were more real to him than they were to any other.

_Then how is it humans got here?_

It can't have been his brother's intention…

_He alone holds the key. He must; he _created_ this world…he created the avatars humans use to walk this land, too._

But that didn't mean anything other than that he wanted to share his world with the rest of his kind.

_But what about the Ghasts? Why would he have created a race whose purpose was to suffer?_

Just because they're unhappy doesn't mean he meant for them to be that way.

_But why would he have put me in this position?_

Maybe nothing needs to be done; maybe it should be left up to humans to deal with the Ender Portal.

_Meaning I support _neither_ race?_

Meaning there is no need for violence.

_I have to help the Endermen…_

A Minecraftian cannot make an unprovoked attack on a fellow Minecraftian.

_My brother can't have wanted this; it doesn't make sense…_

Such was the argument that chased itself around and around in Herobrine's head day and night, ultimately leaving him with a sense of purposelessness. He felt trapped. He didn't even know what to think, never mind what to do.

He couldn't face the Endermen. He deliberately spent the nights swimming in the middle of vast oceans, far away from where any Enderman could survive. He just couldn't tell them that he couldn't help them.

Days became weeks, weeks became months, and Herobrine was still utterly lost. To help one race, he had to battle another; the idea that he was supposed to help and protect all Minecraftians turned this into an utterly unsolvable paradox…and slowly, Herobrine came to terms with the fact that that meant that Notch had not created him for that purpose. It was a painful fact to come to terms with, as it shattered the very foundation of Herobrine's entire sense of self.

_Sense of self…_

It was the middle of the night, months after his disastrous visit to the Nether, that a new thought came to Herobrine as he swam in one of the many new, vast oceans of Minecraftia, like a float being thrown to him in the ocean of turmoil in his own mind:

_I have a choice._

It wasn't duty. Why had his brother created him? He would probably never know; but the fact of the matter was that he had free will, and he could choose what he did.

He could choose _why_ he did whatever he did…and that was liberating.

_My choice…my choice is to do what I must, for the many,_ Herobrine thought. _I'm not going to help the Endermen because it is duty; I am going to help them because it is the right thing to do._

_Besides, the Blaze need to be taught some manners…_


	6. Kill the Blaze!

Herobrine approached the stronghold, a pumpkin once again on his head. This time, though he was uninvited, he had a newer, stronger sense of purpose.

He found the Endermen right away.

_Herobrine…_

_You've returned…_

_You've been away so long…_

_So very long…_

_We were worried…_

_What did you find?…_

_Can you send us home?…_

"My friends," Herobrine said, "I wish to first apologize to you for my behavior of late. I travelled to The Nether in an effort to find what I needed to fix the portal to send you home, and what I encountered there, and the paradox it presented me with, disturbed me. I am better now."

_We're glad you're better…_

_Now, what news?…_

_Can we go home?…_

Herobrine sighed. "In The Nether, I found answers, but they have led me to you with a question, and that question is this: how badly do you all wish to return home? That is, what would you give to go home?"

_Anything…_

"Anything?" Herobrine questioned.

_We cannot stay here…_

_We do not belong here…_

_We will all die if we stay…_

_And those on the other side…_

_Will not know until they get here…_

"More of you keep coming?" Herobrine asked, surprised._ This changes things,_ he thought, wishing he had known that sooner. _Why doesn't my intuition tell me things about the Endermen?_

The Endermen answered Herobrine's question.

_Indeed…_

_We come…_

_Not knowing it's dangerous…_

_And not knowing we'll be trapped…_

_We must go back to warn the others…_

"Very well, but know this," Herobrine said as a swarm of silverfish entered the room. "The materials the silverfish mentioned, blaze rods, are the body parts of a new being that recently came into existence in The Nether. In order to send you home, some of them will have to die. Know that this is on you as much as it is on me; I am willing to do this for you, but only if you understand what must transpire in order to do this for you."

For a minute, the Endermen's whispering voices were silent. Then, one asked a question.

_How many must die?…_

"I know not," Herobrine admitted.

"Six will fix!" exclaimed the silverfish that had just joined them.

"Six?" Herobrine asked.

The Endermen, too, questioned this.

_Six?…_

_But, little guardians…_

_There are twelve blocks…_

"Six will fix!" insisted the silverfish. "One is two! Six is twelve! Six will fix!"

There was a pause, as Herobrine and the Endermen stared at the silverfish with confused bewilderment.

Suddenly, Herobrine understood.

"Twice six is twelve," he told the Endermen. "I believe the silverfish are trying to say that it will take six blaze rods, and that one blaze rod is enough to make two…what was it we needed again?" he asked the silverfish.

"Eyes of Ender!" they squeaked.

"Yes, Eyes of Ender," Herobrine said. Then he asked the silverfish, "So…how many dead Blaze will that amount to?"

"Six! Six will fix!" they repeated.

"But one Blaze is made of twelve blaze rods," Herobrine said, remembering what he'd seen.

"One or none! Blaze decays! Six will fix!"

Herobrine sighed; the way the silverfish spoke - in three-or-four-syllable-long bursts - was cute, and amusing at times, but sometimes it made it really hard to understand what they were trying to say. "Are you trying to say that when a Blaze dies, its body decays, leaving one blaze rod behind at most?" he asked them.

"Yes!" squeaked the silverfish. "One or none!"

"So I may need to kill more than six?" Herobrine pressed.

"Six will fix!" insisted the silverfish.

Herobrine shook his head, deciding to trust the matter to his intuition when the time came. "So I need six blaze rods," he said, "and what else?"

"Ender pearls! Pearls from death! And blaze rods! Blaze powder! Ender pearls! Craft! Mix! Fix!" The silverfish ended their explanation with the three-word mantra they seemed to like so much.

"Blaze powder…?" Herobrine wondered out loud.

He was relieved when it was his intuition, not the silverfish, that explained it to him. _The blaze rods must be crushed, crafted into blaze powder, before they can be used for anything…_

"Ender pearls?" he asked.

This time, it was the Endermen who answered.

_When we die…_

_Our bodies drop pearls…_

_Many of us have died…_

_We've kept the pearls safe…_

_You won't need to kill any of us…_

_We'll give them to you when you need them…_

"And how many will I need?" he asked, getting the feeling it was the silverfish who would be answering that question.

Sadly, he was right.

"One is one!" squeaked the silverfish. "Twelve is twelve! Craft! Mix! Fix!"

"Okay, okay, okay!" Herobrine snapped at the squeaking creatures; they were becoming annoying. He immediately felt bad, and he sighed. "My apologies, friends," he said to the silverfish; "I am feeling a bit on edge. So…I need six blaze rods, twelve ender pearls, and the ability to craft and mix things, yes?"

"Yes!"

And that was when it hit him.

_I need the ability to craft and mix things._

Did he have that ability?

_Oh, no…_

~o~

_A crafting bench…this human has been leaving out a lot of useful things for me…_

Herobrine couldn't carry blocks like the Endermen, but he could carry materials, so there was no need to test that. However, he couldn't craft things on his own, like humans could. He could make things, like saddles, but turning one material into another was something he had never done. That left only one choice: testing whether or not he could use the power of crafting tables.

"Drop it there, please, friend," Herobrine said to the Enderman who had volunteered to come with him and help. Herobrine had decided to test his ability to use that most basic of all materials for crafting: wood. Of course, wood was a block, so he'd needed the help of an Enderman.

The Enderman who had come with him complied, and the dislodged block of wood floated, instead of being set, on top of the workbench that was out in the open for whatever reason.

Herobrine focused, counting on his intuition to direct him._ I want to turn this into four wooden planks,_ he thought. _I need to break this down…_

Suddenly, without thinking, he did it, and the one block burst into four.

"Yes!" Herobrine exclaimed triumphantly.

_Now to put things together,_ he thought. He focused his attention on the four blocks, and again, he suddenly, intuitively knew what to do.

The four blocks flew together, and a new crafting bench was formed.

This time, Herobrine didn't cry out with triumph; he just smiled. I'm all set to help the Endermen.

"Thank you for coming, friend, and for your help," Herobrine told the Enderman. "Would you please do me one last favor? Please carry this to the stronghold and place it inside the portal room; I will be using it."

_Of course, Herobrine…_

~o~

Herobrine was back in the Nether, at the fortress.

The thought of having to kill a fellow Minecraftian, no matter how rude that Minecraftian was or how necessary its death, still made Herobrine uncomfortable. Still, he had made his choice, and the fact that it was a choice - and not duty - somehow made it easier.

He went through the fortress, heading directly to the Blaze birthing cage.

The Blaze he had met before were still there.

"Back again, Herobrine?" asked one of them.

"Yes," Herobrine said, strong and confident, unlike last time. "I am sorry, but I must have blaze rods; the well-being of an entire race depends on it, and I only need six to help them. If I must fight you-" He broke off as another Blaze was born. "If I must fight you to get what I need, so be it," he went on. "Still, I would rather not; you have the choice of giving yourselves up." He paused as his intuition spoke to him, and he added what it said: "If you give yourselves up willingly, you will be reborn from that birthing cage; if you do not, you will permanently cease to exist. Choice is key. What will it be?"

The four Blaze were silent, and Herobrine got the feeling that they were shocked by his change in manner. As they stared at him, another Blaze was born._ I just need one more…_

"You're different this time," one of the older ones said at last.

"I have made my own choice," Herobrine said by way of explanation. "I used to believe it was duty that made me want to help the Endermen, but it's choice, and because I now know that, I will not back down this time. Now, what will it be?"

Another Blaze was born. _That's enough,_ thought Herobrine. _There are enough Blaze here to get the Endermen home. I won't kill more than six unless I absolutely have to, so if more are born, no matter._

Suddenly, two things happened at once: three of the Blaze floated down to the ground - a sign of surrender - and the other three caught fire in preparation to fight.

Herobrine reacted fast. He ignored the Blaze who had surrendered for the moment, focusing on not getting killed by the rebellious ones.

_They can't fire continuously…they shoot three times, then need to cool down…_

Grateful for his intuition, Herobrine dodged the nine fireballs that came at him and the explosions of fire they created, and jumped at the flying Blaze.

They were strong! The fight lasted what Herobrine could only intuitively know to be two full days. Herobrine found himself wishing he could kill faster; he didn't like slowly knocking the life out of fellow Minecraftians, no matter the necessity.

Eventually, though, Herobrine prevailed. Sure enough, one blaze rod was salvageable from each of the dead Blaze.

He turned to the ones who sat waiting.

"Thank you for your sacrifice, friends," he said to them. "I am sorry."

"It's okay," one of them said.

Herobrine nodded, then killed each of them as quickly as he could. They, too, gave one blaze rod each.

_I have enough. There is no more need to stay here._

Herobrine left the citadel and headed back to the portal to The Overworld. As he went home, three Blaze were reborn, one at a time, from the birthing cage in the citadel.


	7. The End

The Ender Portal was different from the last time Herobrine had seen it. Instead of glowing blue blocks, some cracked, it was twelve blocks with round slots in them. Instead of looking and feeling broken, like last time, it just felt like it was…waiting.

_My brother can't seem to find satisfaction with the simple, tried, and true,_ Herobrine thought, and he even surprised himself at the feeling of disdain that went with it. _He always has to over-complicate things, just because he can. So stupid…_

He gave himself a little shake, pushing thoughts of his brother and feelings of disgust at his brother's hubris aside, and addressed the Endermen and silverfish that were crowded in front of him around the portal.

"My friends, I have the blaze rods. Do you have the Ender Pearls?"

_Of course…_

_Right here…_

_We want to go home…_

_Can't wait to go home…_

"You'll be home soon, friends," Herobrine told them as he collected the twelve Ender Pearls the Endermen had gathered for him. He then walked over to the crafting table he had made that the Endermen had placed in a corner of the room. He crushed the blaze rods, divided up the resulting powder into twelve equal parts, and mixed them with the Ender Pearls.

"Eyes of Ender!" squeaked the silverfish.

"Indeed," Herobrine said. They certainly did look like eyes, albeit strange ones. They were almost as creepy in and of themselves as the Endermen were.

With twelve Eyes of Ender in his hand, Herobrine paused as his intuition told him something surprising.

"I will make these as often as I can, friends," he said to the Endermen, "as it seems the Endermen from which these were made can be revived if one of these is struck by lightning.

_That doesn't help us…_

_If we can't go home…_

"True," Herobrine agreed, "but for future reference, give the Ender Pearls to me when one of you dies; I will try to revive your fallen kin when I can. I will not be killing any more Blaze, but perhaps I can steal from the human that's been lurking around here."

_Thank you…_

_Herobrine…_

_Now please…_

_Send us home…_

Herobrine nodded, and he placed the Eyes of Ender in the receptive slots of the portal frame. When he was done, a thin film of black sheeted across the gap framed by the portal frame. The black film gave off light, and reminded Herobrine of the night sky.

_Home…_

_At last…_

Immediately, the Endermen started jumping into the portal, and Herobrine was surprised to see that they vanished instantly - clearly, transporting to The End didn't take time like traveling to The Nether.

_After all the work I've done, and all I've been through, to get here, I wonder…what is The End like?_ Herobrine thought.

Without giving himself a chance at second thoughts, he jumped into the portal with the Endermen…

…and found himself on a platform made of what appeared to be obsidian, floating in the strangest place Herobrine had ever seen.

Herobrine remembered what the Endermen had said about it: _"Empty space…White stone…Black Towers…An empty sky…Nothing more…"_

_"Nothing more"…They weren't kidding,_ Herobrine thought.

The world before him really was empty. The sky was dark gray and fizzled, the whole landscape was bathed in a soft, greenish, seemingly sourceless light, and apart from white stone and towers of obsidian, there appeared to be nothing.

_Who would want to call this place home?_ Herobrine found himself wondering. _It's boring…_

Then he thought about how sunlight, fire, and water alike were all harmful to the Endermen.

_Well, to each their own, I suppose,_ he thought, shrugging to himself. He turned to leave…and stopped short.

There was no portal.

_What the…?_

"Herobrine?"

Herobrine turned, surprised by the voice, and found himself looking at an Enderman.

"Did you just speak to me?" he asked.

"Yes," it replied, utterly shocking him.

"You don't whisper here!" Herobrine exclaimed.

"No; we have voices here. This is our home…thank you for helping us get back. We are forever in your debt."

"It was my pleasure," Herobrine said. "In fact, I feel I owe you and your kind; were it not for your plight, I would still believe myself to be bound by duty, not choice. Having choice is a blessing, and knowing that I have it is very pleasant. I thank you."

"You are quite welcome," said the Enderman.

"Now, if it's not too much trouble, please tell me, friend: how am I to get home?" asked Herobrine.

The Enderman said nothing for a moment. Then it asked, "Why did you come here in the first place?"

"I was curious," Herobrine answered with a shrug. "Now, please, tell me how to get back home."

"I don't know how you're to get home," said the Enderman.

"What?" Herobrine exclaimed.

"We travelled to your world through using the last vestiges of the portal's power, to which we are uniquely bound," the Enderman told Herobrine. "I don't think you can use it like we can."

"So…I'm stuck here?" Herobrine asked.

"Perhaps our lord can help you," said the Enderman. "Please, come, let me take you to him."

Herobrine was too shocked to even ask who or what this 'lord' was. He just followed the Enderman through the strange, empty dimension of shadowy light. It wasn't long before Herobrine started noticing strange crystals on top of the towers of obsidian.

"What are those?" he asked the Enderman who was leading him.

"Our lord's power," answered the Enderman without turning back. "His sustenance, his life force, comes from those crystals. This is where he lives."

"Oh." Herobrine wanted to ask what this 'lord' was like, but before he could put his question into words, the Enderman looked up to the strange pseudo-sky and called out, "My lord, I call upon you! Please, grant an audience to myself and this traveler - our friend, Herobrine, brother of god, who helped us return to you!"

A split second later, an enormous figure appeared in the weird sky. It was black, like the Endermen, and Herobrine got a glimpse of glowing eyes, like the Endermen's, before the enormous behemoth of a creature came down and settled in front of them.

Yes, it was black, and it had the same eyes as the Endermen, but that was where its resemblance to anything Herobrine had ever seen ended. It was enormous, stood on four legs, and had giant wings.

_What is this creature?_ Herobrine wondered.

His intuition provided no answer.

"My lord," the Enderman said formally, giving the strange creature a bow, and Herobrine noticed that an entire crowd of Endermen had gathered and were mimicking the gesture.

"You've returned," said the creature, its voice deep and booming like thunder. "I thought you were lost forever, Enderian."

"I would have been, as would we all, had Herobrine here not fought to fix the portal in The Overworld to send us home," the Enderman called Enderian told the creature.

"Herobrine?" The creature turned its glowing eyes on Herobrine, its voice suggesting mild surprise and a bit of confusion.

"Yes, friend, that is I," Herobrine said. "I am the brother of-"

"Brother of almighty Notch, our creator, yes, I know," the creature interrupted, though somehow managing not to be rude in so doing. "I know much about you, Herobrine. For one thing, I know that you know not what to call me, so I will tell you: I am the Enderdragon."

"Enderdragon…" Herobrine repeated.

The Enderdragon laughed. Its laughter shook the strange, white stone they all stood on, but while it had the potential to be menacing, it was warm and friendly. "Dragons of a weaker sort will be part of your own world soon, o brother of Notch," the Enderdragon told him. Then it lowered its head, extending its long neck towards Herobrine, and said, "It is the way back to your homeworld you now seek, is it not?"

"It is," Herobrine replied.

"Sadly, there is no such thing," the Enderdragon said. "This world was not meant to be seen by the eyes of any but myself and my people, the Endermen. Your brother has created this world as a trap for humans; once they enter, they cannot leave unless they die. Unfortunately, this leaves you in the same predicament."

_Hubris._

Herobrine laughed. He couldn't help it; he was guilty of the same offense as his brother._ This is what I get for my arrogance, _he thought.

He smiled at the Enderdragon.

"Then kill me," he said. "I take this death freely; this is the price it seems I must pay for my arrogance. One day, perhaps, my brother will get his comeuppance as well."

The Endermen behind him erupted into protests.

"That's not fair!" one of them cried. "He helped us get home!"

"He's died for our kind more than enough times already!" exclaimed another.

Herobrine turned to the crowd behind him, still smiling. "Peace, my friends," he said to them. "I was not invited here, and I didn't think to ask if I even had the right to come. I have made the same mistake as any human who comes here will; this is the price I must pay, for sticking my nose in where it doesn't belong." He turned back to the Enderdragon. "I must go home," he told it. "You seem powerful; I doubt a death by your hand would be long or painful. Do what you must."

"Make no mistake, Herobrine, I am grateful to you for fixing the portal, as I'm sure all of my people are," the Enderdragon said apologetically. "I did not create this world, nor did I make these ridiculous rules. The only other way out of here is through killing me, but that exit only leads to oblivion, not your home."

"And that would be worse than being stuck here," Herobrine said.

"I am glad you think so," said the Enderdragon. Then, it raised its head, and said imperiously, "Remember what you have learned in your quest to save my people: you have a choice where to go, and what you do, now and forever."

"I will never forget; I swear on the grave of my past self," Herobrine pledged.

"Good." The Enderdragon paused, tilting its massive head. "Live your life well, o brother of Notch. Be better than your brother, and never forget what your world means."

"I will do my best with the life I have, and I will not forget what Minecraftia means," Herobrine vowed.

"Very good. Now, farewell, o brother of Notch," the Enderdragon said. "I wish I could give you a kinder sendoff."

"That is no fault of your own, my friend," Herobrine assured it. "Perhaps someday, I can come here and visit you without needing to die to go home, if my brother so wills it."

"I pray he will," the Enderdragon said. "Fare thee well."

"Farewell to you, friend," Herobrine said.

The Enderdragon lunged at him, and it was over before Herobrine even had time to feel any pain.


	8. Epilogue

Time went on, of course. Notch continued to complicate Minecraftia, and Herobrine watched the many new abilities his brother gave to the humans who plagued the world. It made him sad, for it was proof, in his eyes, that the power of being a god really had gone to his brother's head, and that his brother no longer had a sense of what the world of Minecraftia was really about - he had become more interested in seeing how complicated he could make it.

Herobrine still fought to defend his world, and now that he was doing so by choice, not by duty, he had no qualms about attacking humans - whether his brother had invited them in or not, they were unwelcome, and that was all. Of course, the impossibility presented by The End might turn out to be enough to drive any human away, but Herobrine didn't like to wait for that eventuality.

Whenever a human was driven away permanently due to one of his brother's new modifications to Minecraftia and the avatars humans used to plague the worlds, it was a victory for Herobrine. Sometimes it was their deaths that were permanent - Herobrine's intuition told him that humans believed that the world ceased to exist, though in reality, the gateway to it was all that was destroyed. Other times, they travelled to The End and were trapped. Still other times, they simply lost any desire to plague the world of Minecraftia and abandoned it, though this was rare. It was especially enjoyable for Herobrine when he himself was the one who caused a human avatar's permanent death.

There was one more surprise awaiting Herobrine, though, and this one was not of his brother's making: not even two days after his return from The End, Herobrine was walking around aboveground at night without a pumpkin on his head - after all, he reasoned, the Endermen were in their strange, empty homeworld; there was no more need for caution - when, to his complete surprise, he stumbled upon nothing other than a group of roaming Endermen!

They looked at him, and Herobrine knew he had stolen their souls with his gaze.

"My friends?" he exclaimed. "What are you doing here? I thought you were in your homeworld!"

_We were…_

_And we'll go back soon…_

_But even though your world is full of perils for us…_

_It is quite beautiful…_

_We would still like to visit sometimes…_

"Of course, you may!" Herobrine assured them. "I just didn't expect to see your kind anymore. I apologize for looking at you; I didn't realize what was happening until it was too late."

_We forgive you…_

_Always…_

_You saved us…_

"And I will save you again," Herobrine said, and he turned away.

The pain that shot through him was brief before darkness swallowed him.


End file.
